by Scott Powers
“Did you ask them about Di?”Eve asked.
He nodded.“She was here, wherever I was. She didn’t know how she got here, and they didn’t tell me if they knew.
“They claimed they had nothing to do with her death,”Max said.“They’d already heard my story before she was found. She came here. And then she got away. They said she was murdered by a human, but not them.
“For some reason I want to believe that,”Max said.
No one spoke for a few moments, and then Max continued.“I sensed her presence there too. I felt her. Crazy, huh?”
“Not as crazy as the story that she was taken by a UFO,”Val said.
Jen interrupted,“I think I hear something.”
They all stopped in silence. The distinct clap of footsteps and male voices came from behind them.
“Shit, that’s Sal,”Max whispered.“You were right, Ted. They’re still after us.”
They quickened their pace, tried doors, and found them locked, and Meln led them into another turn.
Eve caught up with Ted and whispered.“Melnknows more than he’s saying about the sample.”
Ted’s eyes asked her for more.
“First,”she whispered,“he wasn’t surprised when he saw it in your lab. Second, he knew the density. We never tested for that. And remember how confident he was that he could cut it with that diamond saw? Anyone else would have had doubts.”
“I’m not surprised,”Ted said.“Look. Where did they take that stuff? The King Institute? Meln’sgot a research appointment there. He’s probably already run tests on it.”
They walked a bit in silence.
Finally, Max said what they all were thinking.“We have to get into the King Institute.”
“Now that’s nuts,”Jen said.
“Why?”Eve challenged.
“Because it probably has Pentagon-like security, that’s why,”Ted offered.
“Yeah, but everything we’ve come across leads there,”Max said.“If we don’t check it out, we’ll never forgive ourselves.”
“And they got my grandpa’s swatch. And I’m getting it back. If that’s where it is, that’s where I’m going. And you,”Eve said, turning to Ted,“you need it to back up your broadcast.”
Every step of the way, Jen felt drawn further into her brother’s conspiracy world than she’d ever planned.“You guys are nuts. We don’t even know what we’d be looking for, or where.”
Ted pointed to Meln, ten paces ahead.
“He does.”
Melnhesitated at the next juncture as if he didn’t expect it and suddenly realized he was lost. He looked hard down both tunnels. They both looked the same.
“Jesus, you’re lost,”Eve said.
Melndidn’t answer..
“We can’t go back; we have to pick one,”she said.“We could be here all month.”
“Thirty days in the hole,”Max sang.
“Shhhh,”Meln said.
“Thirty days in the hole.”
“Max, quiet.”Eve said. “Do you hear them again?”
“Thirty days in the hole. That’s what they give me. Thirty days in the hooole!”
“Shhhh!”
Max finally shut up and listened. Eve waved to the others behind her to stop. She could hear something too. It wasn’t their pursuers. It was younger voices. It sounded like laughter, giggling, actually.
“We go this way,”Eve said quietly, pointing toward the giggling voices.
“What?”Meln said.
“Sounds like students. If they got in, then they know how to get out. Meln, up here with me.”
Eve took the lead. Meln stepped in with her. The tunnel doglegged, and when they turned the corner, they saw four students sitting under a light.
“Crap, someone’s coming,”said one of the two guys.
They all stood up, and one of them used his foot to grind out what Eve assumed to be a roach. He almost fell over trying and his friends burst into more giggles.
“Relax,”Eve called to them.“We’re just lost. Which way is out?”
“That way,”said a tall young man with glasses, pointing farther down the tunnel. Then he turned and pointed past Eve.“Or was it that way?”
His friends thought that was hilarious. Eve was not amused.
“Which? Way? Out?”she said with authority.
“That way,”said a girl pointing down the tunnel.“There’s a door. Leads up to the service building.”
“Val?”the other girl said.
“Hey, Frances,”Val answered.“What’s up? Tony, Yelena, Goren.”
She was standing next to Ted, about fifteen feet away from the group. Jen stood behind Ted and Max was beside her.
"Friends of yours?" Jen asked.
"Yeah, but it's not like I, you know, I mean I hang with them but I don't ..."
"You don't smoke pot. I get it,” Jen said.“It's okay."
Ted grasped Val's elbow.
“If these are friends of yours, why don’t you join them?”Ted said.“You’re free to go.”
Val looked around at Jen and Max.
“Just wait here until we’re gone.”
“If it’s okay with you, I’d like to stay with you,”she said.“I’d like to help. I want to see how this turns out.”
Eve wasn't sure how to respond. Stockholm syndrome? She knew all about that. In an hour, this young woman had gone from victim to wanting to be part of the conspiracy. It sounded too convenient. On the other hand, Eve thought, keeping her close might not be a bad idea. All they needed was for her to file a kidnapping charge and they'd be the most wanted criminals in Ohio. Especially since she was the daughter of a powerful politician. Meln wouldn't report the kidnapping. He had too many secrets of his own to protect. But Val might.
“No. We can’t let you stay with us. And we don’t need you,”Ted said.“You haven’t done anything wrong yet. But where we’re going, what we want to do. It’s serious. Go home with your friends, kid.”
"Wait a minute, Ted," Eve said.
“Make me,”Val said. She sprinted into the middle of her friends and said something to the brunette named Frances, who looked concerned for a minute, then nodded, and broke into giggles. Val gave her a hug and moved on down the tunnel.
“Let’s go,”she called back. "I told them to mislead the cops if they showed up."
The matter was not decided, but it wasn't ending here, either. So the others followed. The tunnel leveled off and Eve and the others could see a different source of light, about fifty yards ahead. As the students said, there was a door there.
Meln got there first. There were no locks or chains on the door. He pushed the latch and the door opened.
They entered an equipment and supply depot, full of pipe, cable, and tools, and no people. Old, high windows showered blinding sunlight.
Through the doors, they saw a parking lot and trucks. Beyond that was a running path along a river.
“This has been amazing,”Val said. She turned to Eve.“You scared the shit out of me with your gun, but, hey, I’m good. Are you?”
Eve offered her a fist and Val bumped it.
They all stepped into the fresh air and summer heat. There was no one else in the building.
Meln pushed Ted, and Max and Eve flanked them. Jen and Val walked behind. Eve’s cell phone buzzed—the disposable one from Max.
Who could it be? Who had this number? Then she recognized the area code—937. Dayton.
As she answered, Max pantomimed surprise. Eve ignored him.
“Hi,”said a man.“I’m a reporter with the Dayton Daily News, Jim Fish. I want to talk to you.”
Fish said he was assigned by his editor to talk to Dan Rose Senior and look intohis story about the deaths in 1955. He'd gone through Dan Senior’s notebook and spoken to the elder Rose.
He’d also confirmed all the deaths through the clerks’logs and archival police records. He’d found enough to show the timing was at least odd, if not mysterious, tragic, and suspiciously coincid
ental. That was enough to seek interviews. He'd also checked databases.
“We found the old lieutenant, Gleibicz,”he said.“He’s still alive."
Eve's knees buckled as she heard those words. Max reached out to grab her arm, then thought better of it, and stood by to help only if she needed it.
"Gleibiczlives in a little town southeast of Columbus called Nelsonville. He didn’t want to talk to me," Fish said.“In fact, he was downright hostile. But when I mentioned you, his mood changed. I think he’ll meet with you if we just show up.
“Whatayasay?”Fish concluded.“Up to a road trip tomorrow?”
CHAPTER 15
DRIVE, DRIVE, DRIVE
Back at the motel, with Val, who would not go away, and Meln, still considered a hostage even though he appeared to be fully cooperative, Ted, Jen, and Eve huddled in Ted’s room to devise a plan.
Max took a room. Eve shoved him inside and left with hardly a word. He slept away much of the evening.
Max awoke around 10:00 p.m. He went outside to clear his head and found himself standing in the parking lot. A moonless, cloudless sky spread overhead, but the glare of the city washed out most of the stars. The motel sat at the intersection where freeway ramps connected to a busy street. Across the street were small office buildings. Next door was a car wash. It looked like every suburban hotel nook he’d ever stayed in, and he’d stayed in plenty during the band’s early years. This particular place, though, seemed to fit into an exact slot somewhere in his memory.
I’ve been here before. I know this place.
Max wandered to the rear of the motel property. Everything seemed familiar. Across the fence were railroad tracks, then another street, and beyond that there would be a state school, a school for the deaf or blind or something. He walked the motel fence line far enough to see across the tracks and the street. Beyond was an enormous field that stretched for blocks. Somewhere in the back, he could see lights outlining what he knew was a century-old boarding school.
The mist of memory was taking form. Mango Bone had played here in its early days, at a rowdy rock club just up this street, Max remembered the show.
He walked in the warm night back out to the main street and along its grassy shoulder. There were no sidewalks and just enough steady traffic to make the walk slightly unnerving.
About a half mile up, he saw the club. Its parking lot was full. Its lights and the music of a rocking band obnoxiously spilled out.
Calling him.
Back at the motel, Eve’s light was still on. Val answered when Max knocked.
“Let’s burn this nightmare out of us,”Max declared, stepping into the room. Eve sat on the bed. They were watching the late news.“Just for a few hours. There’s a great club just down the street. Let’s go have some fun.”
“Max, are you out of your mind?”
“Eve, I know exactly what we need. It’s been a tough few days, and I need a drink. And I need about 110 decibels of rock‘n’roll.”
"I need some sleep,”Eve said.“I’ve got someplace to go in the morning.”
"You need some fun."
Val begged off. She didn’t drink. She didn’t care for loud music. Running around with a bunch of lawless UFO nuts who kidnapped and shot people and ran from police was one thing, but she knew the place’s reputation. People had been killed there.
“Besides, Dr. Melnsaid the police are probably looking for us,” Val said.“He said those men probably told the police our names and they probably have warrants out. That place is trouble, and where there’s trouble, there’s bound to be police.”
“Sounds like my kind of place,”Max said.
Max was determined to go with or without her, so Eve concluded she needed to go, if only to keep an eye on him. They went as they were in jeans and T-shirts and in need of showers.“We're perfect,” he pronounced.
The row of Harleys and sports bikes on the side told Max this place could draw a real heavy metal crowd yet still appeal to white suburban kids who thought of themselves as headbangers even as they routed toward business careers. The interior fit into all the tumblers in Max’s memory, wide and deep with a low-hanging ceiling. The concert-quality stage was in the back and the four-piece band was blasting a Van Halen cover, though not well.
The place was comfortably full for a weeknight, yet not overcrowded. Max and Eve found a table near a wall. Talking was almost out of the question, but that was all right. Max drank his first beer in seconds and started on a second.
Eve drank her first beer quickly too. Max was right; she needed to unwind. Slowly, she let herself go.
Not long ago, all she wanted was her grandmother’s portrait. Yeah, that was all she’d wanted. Before that, what had she ever wanted?
When she had enlisted, she wasn’t sure. It was just a life option, door number two, for someone who was bored with or incapable of committing to other options. But once she was in, once she found herself excelling in Basic Combat Training, then in Advanced Individualized Training, and once she began mixing with other soldiers who wanted to serve, then that’s what she wanted too. She could shoot and that made her valuable. Being valuable to the Army made her valuable to herself. But there was more, especially once she had been deployed. Performing as trained, as needed: every day that was enough.
Until that day at Ranra’s home. Since then it had been tough to define her wants. Did she have any?
Now there was that swatch. And the corner sample. She wanted those. And she wanted the truth about what happened to her grandmother. And she wanted to help Max and Ted with whatever it was they wanted. She still wasn’t sure. But she felt like she had a mission again. And she could perform.
While Eve drifted in thoughts of her life, Max had struck up a conversation with four young people at the next table. He sat down with them. That annoyed Eve but he wasn't done. They lifted their drinks and stood. Max and one of the guys shoved their table over to Eve's and he and Max re-arranged the chairs.
"Eve, this is Rob, Lea, Tre, and…uh,”
"Amy," said the big blonde with a loose chin and low-cut red dress. She lifted her bottle high. "Hey! Rock and roll!"
Lea, with Goth-like black hair, dark eyes, and a lacy black dress, saluted with her bottle. "Fuckin' yeah!" she screamed.
Rob and Tre looked like they had office jobs to return to in the morning but were doing their best to keep up with the girls, betting on their long shots of getting laid. Eve assumed these weren't dates. This was a pickup, though she wasn't sure by whom. The boys were out of their league, parties-wise, with these girls. But they were trying.
"So what do you guys do?" one of the guys asked. It didn't matter to Eve which was which.
"I shoot people.”
The boys looked dumbstruck for a moment then broke out into grins. She was kidding, right? their faces said. Lea reached out with her bottle to clink Eve's. She obliged.
"We hunt UFOs," Max said.
The boys’ grins disappeared.
"Seriously," one of them pleaded.
"Seriously. We travel the country solving UFO mysteries. That's why we're here."
"Must be the band," Lea said.
"That's stupid," the smaller, dumpier guy said. "UFOs aren't real. They're fantasies, for ignorant people."
Max smiled. Eve sucked on her beer.
"You know, there are more than 3,000 reported sightings a year in the U.S. alone? That’s ten a day. That's a lot of ignorant people."
"Like I said."
"What does that kind of work pay?" Amy asked.
Max reached into his pocket and pulled out a wad of hundred-dollar bills.
“Jesus,”the taller guy said.“Better be careful waving those around. There’s people here who’d jump you for a wad like that.”
"Like Lea," Amy said.
"That's what I got her for," Max said.
"Her?" the shorter guy asked.
"Remember?" Eve said. She raised her gun slightly from her purse. "I shoot people."
Silence overtook the table. The boys clearly were rethinking their decision to join Max's table. But the girls seemed excited by the danger. Lea reached out her beer to tap Eve's again.
“Fuckin' A!" Lea said.
“Fuckin' A!" Eve replied, accepting the clink.
"Rock and roll!" screamed Amy.
Max peeled a hundred-dollar bill from the wad and used it to wave down a waitress. He ordered three pitchers of beer.
And for a while a simple pattern emerged as Max drank, and he and the two young women shouted, while the two young men tried to keep up, but clearly couldn’t, and Eve, who had a nice warm glow, paced herself.
Max worked on winning the guys over, because he couldn’t stand leaving anyone behind in a party. Eventually, they eased into the party. Max was in his element. The beer went fast.
“We do what we do so we can do this too," Max shouted at the guys. "I just wish the show wasn’t so weak.”
The show was rather lame. The band rocked back and forth between light grunge, classic rock, and current pop rock, playing covers mostly, with an occasional original song the singer introduced, but those mostly sucked. There was no identity to the band’s music. Max pointed out that the lead guitarist was skilled. He probably would leave the band soon and hook up with some better mates. For now, the other three were serviceable, but they weren’t providing the energy necessary to awaken this crowd. Max’s table was providing most of the energy in the room.
The singer announced a short break. After a few minutes, one of the stagehands came out and ran a mike check for the final set. When the stagehand turned his back to leave the stage again, Max saw that as his moment.
He stood.
"We need to crank this party up!" Max announced to the table.
"Ayiee!" Amy agreed.
“They’ll be back in a couple minutes. Watch this,”he said.
“Where are you going?” Eve asked.
“Better to ask forgiveness than permission, right?”
He strode along the wall to the corner and then along the back wall to the corner of the stage.
